


liminal space

by falloutboiruto



Category: Boruto: Naruto Next Generations
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon-Typical Violence, Child Neglect, Episode Fix-it, Family Bonding, Gen, Medical Trauma, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, References to Depression, Suicidal Ideation, episode 173 reaction fic, mild gore(in like. a dream), no beta reader we die like men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:55:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27478405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/falloutboiruto/pseuds/falloutboiruto
Summary: Of course Mitsuki would do anything to save his teammates from getting killed by Deepa. Any personal consequence he may face is worth it. But getting stuck in an underground lab awaiting an organ transplant, left with nothing but his own thoughts, wasn't quite what he had imagined.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	liminal space

**Author's Note:**

> my google doc for this fic is called "buttmad about episode 173" LMAO
> 
> this fanfic is VERY dark in places. like i say in the tags, this fanfic is about medical trauma(could potentially be triggering to some). there's also some suicidal ideation, mild gore/violence and depictions of ptsd. read at your own discretion. ALSO warning for team orochimaru just being jerks in general. A lot of their opinions are not meant to reflect reality they're just rly mean

Being dragged back to his parent, still alive but barely so, wasn’t a possibility Mitsuki had considered. He’d put an undue amount of stress on his body in order to get his friends, Boruto and Sarada, as far as possible from Deepa(Kara member, prone to waxing poetic about torture and death, _impossibly strong_ ). That was for certain. Deepa had demonstrated a new-discovered level of both maliciousness and bloodlust that made it clear that if given the chance, Deepa wouldn’t just have killed them all. He would have taken great pleasure in killing them as slowly and painfully as possible. And so, in the heat of battle, Mitsuki had done a cost/benefit analysis. Either they would all die together, or Mitsuki could save them. Any price he’d pay would be worth it.

But he hadn’t imagined the paid price being quite like this. A hum from the bright fluorescent ceiling lights in the lab room combined with the steady beeping of the heart monitor felt like bees buzzing in his ears. The tube in his side, connecting him with the liver dialysis machine, made it impossible for him to lay down on his right side. He could either endlessly stare up into the ceiling(too bright most of the time), or turn over to face the door(and await the next time someone would come and check on him). If he turned around too fast, he’d get vertigo and almost puke from the nausea. It was getting harder to tell the days, hours, minutes apart with no calendar or clock. He had a theory based on the amount of time his caretakers would turn the lights off. They'd check in on him every hour(every four hours during lights-off-time). Either his parent, Suigetsu or Log would check on his vitals, ask him if he needed to go to the bathroom(bringing all the medical equipment in with him necessitated another, not-in-need-of-an-organ-transplant person), and then leave. At night, one of them would sneak in and yet again, control his vitals, but as silently as possible. If they noticed that he was awake, they’d give him a shot to knock him right out. As he’d gotten used to the routine, Mitsuki had gotten better and better at pretending to be asleep. Hearing the soft breathing and movements of another actual human being in the same room as him was somewhat comforting even if he had to keep his eyes shut. If he slept, well-

-he’d dream of Konoha. The dreams were mostly a mish-mash of sensory experiences that made him remember what once was. 

Smells of the street food that he’d never tried to eat. 

Constant murmuring from pedestrians walking back and forth on the dwindling streets jammed between tall buildings. 

Clouds, drifting in the sky. 

Sunrays that had warmed his skin.

Then, in an instant, it could just as well shift to short flashes of bright blue lights in a dark room, being submerged in some kind of gooey fluid, unable to move, drifting in and out of consciousness. Like repressed memories bubbling under the surface. Sometimes, he’d see his parent’s pale face, frowning, on the other side of the glass, wanting to beg them _Please-_

He’d wake up, choking, like his lungs were still full of liquid. At those times, he’d wish that his grandiose sacrifice to save his two teammates had been the end of it. That he wouldn’t have returned-

“Hey, you okay there, buddy?” Suigetsu asked. He swivelled in his desk chair and dragged himself, wheels squeaking, away from studying the second-largest monitor. Once the screeching of the desk chair wheels had stopped, Suigetsu leaned over Mitsuki’s face at an almost uncomfortably close scrutiny. “You’re flopping like a fish. Gasping like one on dry land, too.”

Mitsuki calmed his breathing while his heart still raced like it was beating out of his chest. He forced a weak smile that was only slightly ruined by him curling up in a coughing fit seconds later.

“D’ya want… some water?” Suigetsu pushed himself back, still leaning forward, hands on his knees. He impatiently tapped one finger on his thigh, creating a drum beat of sorts in-tact with the heart monitor as its rapid beeping slowed down to normal.

“Yeah,” Mitsuki rasped out. He had entangled his arms in the IV tube again. Suigetsu shot him a weary look but helped him disentangle himself.

“Don’t want you pulling your IV out like last time. Remember that?”

He didn’t. From Mitsuki’s(low) vantage point, he could only see the purple pant legs of Suigetsu’s jumpsuit get up. A couple of footsteps and 10-seconds of running water later, he returned. “You need to sit up to drink. Wait! I’ll help you.”

Hands gently grabbed Mitsuki and turned him onto his back again. The upper part of the gourney shifted upwards with a mechanical whirr, and his blanket slid off his upper body. He grasped after it, but his fingers wouldn’t form a grip. It was cold.

“Ugh, let me-” Suigetsu pulled the blanket up to his shoulders again. A plastic cup came into Mitsuki’s view again and was placed against his lips. “I hope you remember how to drink, at least?” The corner of Suigetsu’s mouth twitched in a sort-of smile. Mitsuki could only drink about half of the contents of the (very small) cup. “Feel better?”

“-how many days are left until my organ transplant?” 

Suigetsu winced. “Well, yesterday, Orochimaru told me, and also you, that you’ll have surgery in a month. So, my guess is 29-30 days from today. Which is a month minus one day.”

“Oh.”

“Don’t you remember?” He took Mitsuki’s silent stare as a no. “-Oh right. Log told me that he sedated you afterwards. I guess that would make the details a little hazy.” Suigetsu scratched the back of his head and looked over at the desk where he had apparently placed the discarded half-empty plastic cup of water. It didn’t seem to comfort him much. After some grumbling and presumably searching for something new, not-organ transplant-related to bring up, he finally came up with; “Do you wanna, I dunno, talk about something?”

“I don’t know,” Mitsuki let his eyes rest for a second. The overhead lights made them watery and runny. _Yes, anything, please just babble about the most inane thing you could possibly come up with; wa_ s what he wanted to say. But he couldn’t muster up the energy for a compound sentence. Luckily, he didn’t have to. The lab door swooshed open and Orochimaru came into view.

“I hope you’re not scaring Mitsuki again, _Suigetsu_.” They shot him a murderous look. Suigetsu squirmed as he muttered something that sounded suspiciously alike to _you’re one to talk._ Orochimaru pulled up a chair to Mitsuki’s bedside. Now that they were so close, there was something slightly off about his parent. Something weary, and strained. Worried, even. “I’m just stopping by to say that in case your kidneys fail too, I have started making back-up ones. They’ll be ready at the same time as the other stuff." They made a sweeping gesture with their manicured hand that seemed to imply Mitsuki’s entire body was getting replaced.

“So, in a month?” As long as he didn’t have to wait much more than that.

“Well, there’s the physical therapy too. That should take a while,” Orochimaru turned to Suigetsu. “He at least needs to be able to keep up with _you_ in sparring before we can even think about discharging him, right?”

Suigetsu flinched. “Yeah, sure! We’ll work hard, huh, Mitsuki? You’ll be back in Team 7 with Boruto and Sarada in no-time!” He pumped his fist in the air in a way that was very unlike him.

There was no possible way for Mitsuki to express how he felt about this information, so he just asked to be left alone to sleep. Well, at least until the next check-up in presumably an hour.

-

A few hours(?)/check-ups later, Log had to escort Mitsuki(and his herd of medical devices. Luckily enough they had wheels) to the bathroom. Log left him alone and awkwardly half-closed the bathroom door behind him, “Just tell me if you need any help!”, his voice muffled like he’d already turned around for _extra_ privacy(like the door between them wasn’t enough).

While washing his hands Mitsuki accidentally caught a glance of himself in the mirror above the sink. His reflection, paler than usual, hollow-eyed, hair messy and greasy, tightly wrapped up in a blanket(Log had fussed over him), stared back at him. Curious, he leaned closer, almost losing his balance and having to brace himself against the sink. Was it just the bathroom lighting, or did the whites of his eyes have a decidedly yellow tint? Come to think of it, his face was sallow and the bags under his eyes looked more like bruises. The sliver of his collarbone between the gaps of the blanket over his shoulders cast much more of a shadow than it used to.

Well back on the gurney in the lab room that sort of felt like home by now, Mitsuki realized that he was winded to the point of exhaustion after a barely-20-meter-walk. Every shallow breath ached, despite being drugged up to his ears with painkillers. All he had to do was ask, and Log sedated him again. He didn’t want to have to think about anything anymore.

-

In his dreams, he could reunite with his friends again. Things had seemed so simple, back then. 

Practicing with kunai and shuriken at the training grounds dartboard together(Sarada would always get a perfect score and Boruto would get _so_ jealous. Konohamaru-sensei would scold them until they made up).

Eating lunch at Thunder Burger afterwards. Mitsuki wouldn’t ever eat, but he’d observe the social cues of his friends as they bickered and threw french fries at each other. 

How the rest of his old class at the Ninja Academy had accepted him back after he’d deserted the village and run away to the Land of the Earth. Without questioning him even once.

Mikazuki entering his life, a warm(and fuzzy) creature that was even harder to understand or communicate with than other humans. Even so, they’d cuddle with him every time he felt lonely-

-the dreamscape shifted. But instead of almost-lost snapshots from the inside of a lab tube, he’d be back in the forest clearing where everything began and ended at the same time.

He was gasping for air after being violently thrown into the mud. The turned-away backs of Sarada and Boruto, impossibly tiny, god they were just children, as they fought for their lives against Deepa. The villain disregarded them, like people litter trash, by knocking his two friends into the ground while they screamed in pain. But they didn’t stay down. They didn’t get up. Nothing like what had happened in reality. At first, cracks formed in Sarada’s exposed shoulders. Boruto, face down in the dirt, began disintegrating. Mitsuki’s friends turned into dust in front of his eyes, leaving no trace and-

Deepa, suddenly closer than Mitsuki could ever anticipate, grabbed him by his hair and lifted him off the ground. As Mitsuki struggled to reach Deepa’s smug grin with his fists, a kick, _anything_ , the villain extended a carbon-covered claw and stabbed Mitsuki in the gut. He could feel it twisting, ripping him apart from the inside and as all of his guts came spilling out in a bloody mess all he could think of was;

 _ilovethemsomuchimissthemsomuchwhywhywhywhywhYWHYWHYWHYWHYWHYWHY and the_ n he’d wake up in the lab room, flailing, almost falling off the gurney. All alone. The lights were still turned on. As far as everyone but him was concerned, nothing had happened.

-

“You know, Mitsuki,” Suigetsu drawled. “We have a surprise for you!” He gestured(with jazz hands and all) to Orochimaru and Log shuffling into the room in a straight line. Log carried an extra chair, but in Orochimaru’s hands rested a mobile phone. They were covering its surface strangely, like they were trying to muffle any noise a possible listener on the other line would hear.

Mitsuki squinted at them. He had barely slept during the (presumed) night at all. With frazzled nerves and a heavy headache, he wasn’t really in the mood for something as large as a three-person audience. 

“ _Someone_ wants to talk to you,” Orochimaru said, and handed the phone over to Suigetsu. Suigetsu held the phone towards Mitsuki like he expected him to take it, but then-”Right. Your lack of grip strength.” He held the phone to Mitsuki’s ear as both Log and Orochimaru sat down in the periphery. Mitsuki drew a heavy sigh.

“Hello?”

Static bristled in his ear, and he was just about to give up when-

“Mitsuki? Are you there? Your parent said you were awake-”

“Boruto?” Mitsuki, suddenly alert, made a weak attempt to sit up. The head end of the gurney rose to support him. “Are you-are you-”

“Yeah, I’m alive! Out of the hospital, better than ever. Wait, Sarada! Let me talk to him first-”

“Mitsuki!” Sarada’s voice all-but-shouted after a bunch of shuffling noises, like she had wrestled the phone out of Boruto’s hands. “How are you? Are you ok?”

“Yeah, I’m-” he faltered. “I’m fine. I’m having surgery in a month or so.” Swallowing a giant lump in his throat, he decided to deflect. “Are you guys back in action yet?”

The line went quiet for a moment. “Yeah. We are,” Sarada said, matter-of-factly. “We’re still investigating Kara. We just rendezvoused with Konohamaru-sensei. He’s also here, if you want to talk to him-”

“Mitsuki!” from the sounds of it, Boruto had snatched the phone back. “We’re in a telephone booth in hostile territory and we can’t talk for long. So I just want to say that we can’t wait for you to get back, we miss you so much-”

“Yeah, we do,” Sarada’s and Konohamaru-sensei’s muffled, distant-sounding voices agreed in the background.

“-so please, get well soon!”

“Uh, Mitsuki?” Suigetsu stage-whispered, bringing him back to the stark reality that he was stuck on life support in an underground lab room for god-knows-how-long. “Are they being mean to you, or something? I'll kick their asses.”

“No, I-” Mitsuki said, but the words got stuck in his throat. His nose was so clogged he could barely breathe. Shivers all over his body made him tremble. His face was moist to the point of just feeling gross. “I’m just-” he sobbed, “-really not doing great. I feel awful all the time.”

“Oh,” Boruto said, the line going silent.

“Eek,” Suigetsu said, glancing back at Orochimaru(furious) and Log(extremely sweaty) and started some kind of angry silent staring competition with them. Complete with over-exaggerated deadly eyebrow waggles and rude hand gestures.

“I just-I’m so weak, I can barely do anything except sleep. And when I sleep, all I dream about is you and Sarada dying-” a shrill tone was entering Mitsuki’s voice at this point, but he didn’t care. “I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry I couldn’t do more for you. I-” his tears mixed with snot and dripped down his chin.

“-and that’s enough.” Orochimaru, with a flimsy layer of forced calm, stood up. But before they could take the phone away-

“No! Let me talk to them,” Mitsuki screamed. “I hate it here. I haven’t seen my friends since they almost died and you just leave me alone all the time-”

Orochimaru backed off, holding their hands up in defeat. A slightly hysterical snicker came from Suigetsu, who kept the phone held to Mitsuki’s ear. The other line was still silent.

“Boruto? Are you still-”

“Right, right. I’m here,” Boruto said. “I heard what you said. And I’m the one who should be sorry. We haven’t really, y’know, tried to contact you all that much. I’m really, really sorry you got hurt. I’m sorry you’re dealing with this. This is really hard for all of us, actually. I-uh.” A pause. “Do you want to talk to Konohamaru-sensei? He’s y’know, an adult. I just don’t really know what to say-” He chuckled self-consciously. “Yes, Mitsuki’s really upset. Yeah, just-”

“Mitsuki!” Konohamaru-sensei said(but mostly shouted). “I’m so sorry you’re having a hard time. When we get back from this mission, we will visit you! I promise!”

“Oh-uh, thanks. I’m sorry,” he tried to wipe at his eyes with the blanket. “I’m so sorry for all the trouble I’ve caused.”

“You have nothing to be sorry for. _I’m serious._ You protected your teammates, and you got hurt. Now, you have to recover. It’s crucial that you take your time.”

At this point, Mitsuki was sobbing too hard to even talk.

Another pause. “You know, we don’t have much more time. I’m out of coins, eheh. But I promise I’ll try to contact Konoha so that your old Academy friends can, I don’t know, send letters to you, or something? Does that sound good?”

“Y-yeah.”

“Okay. Great.”

“Thank you for calling. I-” He took a deep breath.”I love you guys.”

“ _Thank you_ for telling us,” Konohamaru-sensei said. “And we love you too. Say good-bye to Mitsuki, everyone!” Sarada and Boruto started talking over each other, tripping over words, seemingly in a competition about who could say good-bye the loudest.

“Bye. We’ll see eachother soon,” Mitsuki said, and the call ended.

As he fully realized what had just happened in the last five minutes, by all standards, he should feel ashamed. Ashamed for sobbing his eyes out, ashamed for yelling at his parent, ashamed of just being in the way. But he wasn’t.

Suigetsu clutched the phone to his chest, his jaw open so wide that it almost looked dislocated. Orochimaru and Log wore similar looks of shock, only that their jaws were in a state that would most definitely be considered dislocated if they were normal humans. Well, they weren’t. None of them were.

“Okay,” Orochimaru snapped their mouth shut and crossed their arms. “I see that Boruto and girl-Sasuke mean a lot to you.”

“Konohamaru-sensei too,” Mitsuki sniffled. "But yes.”

“Right, right, the grandson of _that guy_ ,” Orochimaru dismissed him rather flippantly. Then, their face softened. “Do you want us to spend more time with you? I’ll admit, it must be rather boring to be cooped up in here all by yourself.”

“I can listen to your stories about Konoha, Mitsuki!” Log said. “I’ll listen to them all day.”

“And I can tell you all about swords!” Suigetsu interjected, like they were now competing on who could be the most supportive. Sure, it was awkward and slightly stilted, but it was clearly well-intentioned. “Kids love swords, right?” Log joined him in his cheering as if to further hype up the awesomeness of swords.

“Listen,” Orochimaru said. “Your, ugh, _sensei_ screamed loud enough for us to hear it. If you do get any letters from your Konoha friends, I’ll give them to you straight away. I’m sure they’ll send them.” Then, they grimaced. “Mitsuki. Do you need, uh, a tissue-”

-

Sure enough, only after a few days could be marked off in the new lab room calendar(complete with cute pictures of different cats for every month), the letters started coming in.

“You want me to read this for you?” Orochimaru asked. “I did teach you how to read, right?”

As Mitsuki was slightly too drowsy to focus his eyes, he insisted by nodding. His family had pulled up chairs next to the gurney, a high stack of mail at Mitsuki’s feet. The clock on the wall facing him told him that it was late afternoon.

“Oh-uh, ok. Well, this first letter is from your little friend-” they squinted at the paper, eye twitching slightly. “ _Inojin_? People must just name their kids the first thing they could think of these days, or so it seems-”

“Inojin?” Suigetsu interrupted them. “I think I’ve met him! That’s the blond twerp I threatened to kill, right?”

“Yes, that’s the one,” Mitsuki deadpanned. It was in that moment that he decided that the next bad habit his family had to quit was their extreme unpleasant attitudes towards people he cared about.

“I can’t wait to hear about Inojin. He sounds nice,” Log said.

“Well, if you shut up for a second, I’m gonna read it! Okay. So to summarize, Inojin and his, and I assume also your, friends have been going to your apartment every day to feed your cat. What now, you have a cat?”

“Read the whole thing! Don’t just summarize!”

“Oh look, they included pictures!”

“Don’t hog them, I want to see!”

“Shut up, you two! How can I read the whole thing when you two scatterbrains chatter away like deranged chickens-”

The End

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! if you've enjoyed this, please leave me a kudos and comment something if you want to


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